


You Just Start and I’ll Say When

by enbookcased



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Angst, Bad Dreams, Canon Compliant, Exhaustion, Insomnia, M/M, Multi, Sleep Deprivation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-01
Updated: 2020-09-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:00:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26185339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enbookcased/pseuds/enbookcased
Summary: Jisung didn’t so much sleep at night as collapse. Changbin and Chan always made sure to be there to catch him, even when they were falling themselves. Even when they were already on the floor.
Relationships: Bang Chan/Han Jisung | Han/Seo Changbin
Kudos: 121
Collections: Jilix Ficfest





	You Just Start and I’ll Say When

**Author's Note:**

> For Jilix Fic Fest - Jisung Week. Prompt: "jisung has trouble sleeping, person b just can't sleep that night. they cuddle together on the bed, betting on who can stay awake for longer. person b wins after a while, jisung asleep in their arms, only to realize the crush they've been harboring is actually love." I promise I didn't mean to subvert this prompt, it just sort of... happened? I mean, I’m not projecting in this at all, no. Pfft. Jisung absolutely isn’t how I feel on an almost daily basis, what? That’s crazy talk. 
> 
> I hope y'all enjoy anyway!

Exhausted. Lethargic. Just plain fucked out of energy. Being a rapper, singer, dancer, and producer was taking its toll on all of them, but especially Jisung, who had been pushing himself harder, harder, harder still, never feeling like he’s good enough. Chan could see it on his face as if Jisung had written it there in marker, in sharp relief were lines of worry, of fear. Could they, would they, can they, did they? Was it good enough? No, it was never good enough. Yes, but good enough needed to be better. Stronger. Harder. Faster. Greater. _Greatest_. Go. Go. Go. _Go_.

“Hannie, where’s that song you were working on?”

“Ah, hyung, it’s not ready. I’m not happy with it yet.” Jisung’s smile was sheepish, but beneath it Chan could see the shame. He’d promised the song two days ago. Chan could see he was beating himself up, so he refrained from adding to the torment, even though it piled onto his own frustrations.

\--

The clothes they wore now were nicer, sure, but the bones that lay underneath were broken and mended in stranger ways, and sometimes they weren’t fixed at all. Jisung’s limp, to carry the one on the metaphor, was the most obvious. But he wouldn’t let it stop him.

Jisung was there for Hyunjin went he fell for the tenth time during extended dance practice. He was there with tea for Seungmin when his throat felt like it was going to bleed. He made sure to be in the dorm whenever Jeongin got back late from school with cup ramen. He bought the medical tape for Minho’s feet, never let their stash run low. Kept lip balm on him at all times because Chan always forgot his. Patiently coached Felix through the more complex customs. Always listened to Changbin’s lyrics to check if the flow worked.

But he was both physically and mentally incapable of taking care of himself.

\--

One time Jisung fell asleep standing upright in the sound booth. Chan wouldn't have believed it if he hadn't looked up from the console and saw it with his own eyes. He nudged Changbin, who sighed and got up; he entered the studio cautiously, not wanting to startle Jisung. He didn't even wake when Changbin gently shook him. Changbin ended up with Jisung leant against his back as he half-drug, half-carried him to the couch. Jisung was always known for falling asleep in weird places, but that had definitely been the weirdest.

“We can’t keep doing this,” Changbin protested.

“Just a bit longer,” Chan always replied. “Just a little further.”

“We’re almost there.”

\--

Jisung didn’t so much sleep at night as collapse. Changbin and Chan always made sure to be there to catch him, even when they were falling themselves. Even when they were already on the floor.

Jisung ate beats, bled lyrics. Late nights and full bass. Pissed and cried music until it was all that existed under his very skin, his video camera eyes lined in kohl. He would dial down in the dead of night, the blue light from his phone flashing YouTube conspiracy videos across his wan, drawn face. Changbin would sit in the corner and chew on his bottom lip and watch him and worry. He would tap Chan, cause him to look up from his own deadlight screen full of Twitter mentions, blink his owl eyes over.

“He’s a fucking zombie, hyung.”

“I know, but I don’t know what to do about it.”

“He’ll listen to you, you’re the leader.”

“He listens to me about as well as we ever listened to our teachers before debut. I can’t tell him what to do, Changbin. All we can do is be there for him, for when he’s ready to tell us what he needs.”

So Changbin watched over Jisung and ignored his own heart as it bled out onto the ground.

\--

“Fuck you, man. I'm not tired,” Jisung said through a yawn, tears pooling at the corner of each eye. Changbin watched them stream unaided down his face. “I bet you twenty thousand won you'll fall asleep before I do.”

Changbin smirked, his own eyes heavy with fatigue. “You’re on, Hannie.” Whatever it took.

Changbin held out the bag of chips, a contraband gifted to Chan from Sana, and Jisung accepted the bribe. They stayed there, in each other's bubble, propped up like they didn't have the strength to sit up on their own. For all Changbin knew, they might not have. Changbin watched YouTube over Jisung’s shoulder, various fancams that Minho had sent over with specific instructions. Changbin watched his dispassionately—it was in the past, who cared if he missed a step then as long as he didn’t do it again—but Jisung agonized over every tiny mistake. Chan never watched, too preoccupied with other things.

“You’re just working yourself up. There's nothing we can do to change it,” said Changbin.

“But this way I won't let it happen again.”

“Or you're more likely to repeat the mistake because it's fresh in your head.”

And Jisung would always argue with them, but Changbin didn't care because he always did it in their arms, splayed across their bodies, or against them in some connective way. If arguing with Jisung got him to make absurd bets he almost certainly always lost—

If arguing was their way of spending quality time—

If arguing got Jisung to unwind—

Then that's what Chan and Changbin did.

\--

When Jisung’s eyes would finally close, he’d slump; they’d catch. It was so often by now it was rote. As common as Minho’s filters, as Hyunjin’s poetry. Chan and Changbin would catch their youngest, the ancient burial ground that was their third, and tuck him into them, walk him home. Carry him some nights. Drop him on a bed, never his own, and fold in around him, one or both. Make bets on who could fall asleep first. Only then would they, all three, dare to close their eyes, hesitantly, begrudgingly. Like it took something precious from them each time to do so.

“Chan.”

Chan rolled his dried-out, burning eyes over at Changbin, who sat against the wall, Jisung curled up in his lap. Snoring lightly. Finally succumbed. “What.” He didn’t mean for it to come out sounding as dead as it did, but he was honestly on his last tether, about to drop into the abyss any second himself.

Changbin licked his bottom lip; the bags under his eyes were deeply pronounced, his bb cream having worn off thirteen hours ago. “I think…” He stopped, inhaled, Chan assumed to find the courage within himself to say out loud what Chan already saw floating in the air of the room. Changbin carded his fingers through Jisung’s hair, smoothing gently through the tangles. A parental gesture. A significant other’s gesture. “I think I love him.”

Chan’s mouth quirked, barely. “I know you do, Bin. Me, too.”

“No, I—” Changbin opened his mouth to object, to clarify, but Chan held up a hand. It took all the strength in him.

“Changbin, trust me. I know. And I feel the same. About—” Chan grimaced, sucking air in through his teeth. There was nothing except to go for it. Winner take all, loser goes home with nothing. Not even a parting gift. Not even the at-home game. “About you both.”

Changbin’s mouth was open in a little O of surprise. Chan didn’t have it in him to interpret that at the moment, he was too tired, his head pounding too hard. “Later, Bin. We can talk about it later,” he sighed, rolling over onto his side, facing the wall. He closed his eyes. He didn’t sleep.

It had to have been over an hour before he heard anything else in the room. He just lay patiently, waiting for sleep to take him or for morning to properly dawn, whichever came first, when he heard, “Hyung.”

He shifted, looked over. Changbin was beckoning, hand outstretched. Chan could barely make it out in the dark. “Hyung, come here. I can’t love him alone.” Changbin swallowed, and Chan wondered what these words were costing him. In a voice like something heavy being dragged over gravel: “I need your help.”

Chan went. He could never say no to either of them. He never would.

He slipped in next to Changbin, pressed close on the tiny bed, back wedged against the wall. Jisung lay motionless on Changbin’s lap, but when Chan came it was like he knew he was close. Jisung shifted, rolling on his back a bit, an arm flopping across Chan’s lap. Changbin hiked an eyebrow, ‘See?’ it said.

Chan slid his hand inside Jisung’s, whose fingers convulsed around his. He smiled. It was enough. He was enough.

They were enough. He hoped.

\--

Jisung awoke later with a shudder, sucking in air, eyes wide. He flailed until Chan caught his hand, causing Jisung's eyes to lock onto him. “What is it? Hannie?”

“Chan, I—” He looked from him to Changbin, eyes wild. “I dreamt I died.”

Changbin took Jisung's hand, rubbing his thumb over his knuckles. “Just a dream, Sung.”

“I don't want to die, hyung.” His voice was a study in tiny. “I don't want to not be here, with you guys. I need—” Jisung broke off. Changbin could feel a hot wetness soak through the leg of his pants, where Jisung pressed his face.

Chan and Changbin shared a fathoms-deep look over Jisung. “We know, Jisung,” Chan whispered. They both soothed at Jisung, fingers in his hair and on his skin until he fell back into a dreamless sleep, tear-streaked face slackening.

“We know.”


End file.
